Co-Texts
The Biblical Story
The story in Midrash Mishle is an elaboration of the biblical story, where we are told of the Queen of Sheba’s visit to Solomon (1 Kings 10:1–13; 2 Chron. 9:1–12).28 The biblical story is obscure. The biblical text specifies a reason for the queen’s visit: “to test [Solomon] with riddles”; but the questions are not given in the Bible. What the Bible does provide is a detailed description of the wealth and grandeur of the two sovereigns and of the gifts that they exchange. This detailed catalog of riches, combined with the terse description of the actual meeting, produces a curious distribution of information regarding the facts of the visit. We are told that the queen “came to test him with [riddles]…. When she came to Solomon, she asked him all that she had in mind. Solomon had answers for all her questions” (1 Kings 10:1–3). After seeing Solomon’s wisdom, wealth, power, and the high regard in which he is held, the Bible says that “she was left breathless” (10:5). Something happened there, but what?
The midrashic story seeks to answer this question by filling in the gaps that are typical of biblical poetics.29 For our purposes, it is sufficient to note that the story lies at a juncture between two central themes in the Bible’s account of Solomon’s character. On the one hand, he is portrayed as the wisest of men;30 on the other hand, the Bible emphasizes Solomon’s fascination with foreign women. The price paid for this transgression was heavy: his kingdom was split, and his heirs ruled only Judah.
The Queen of Sheba is a foreign woman who comes to test Solomon’s wisdom. In this respect, the biblical episode in 1 Kings 10 presents Solomon as a wise man but also as one who is able to resist and overcome a foreign woman. The biblical narrative provides erotic hints in the description of the encounter (“she came to prove him … she came to Jerusalem … she came to Solomon”): the verb “to come” (ב-ו-א) frequently bears sexual connotations in the Bible.31 The narrative even creates a pseudo-matrimonial background by elaborating on the exchanged gifts as if they were a dowry, and possibly through the association between riddles and wedding ritual. It is therefore impossible, as the midrashic reading points out, to overlook the erotic tensions that arise in the story itself. Nor can one ignore the tensions underlined by the position of this episode in the sequence of events that outline Solomon’s character. Our story appears at a critical turning point of his biography. He has already attained an international reputation as a wise and powerful king, and he stands on the verge of his descent into pagan worship, succumbing to his foreign wives.
The biblical story is a necessary co-text for understanding the text in Midrash Mishle. It leads to an understanding of the riddling situation and of the riddles themselves, in view of the two central themes dominant in Solomon’s character: he is the wisest of men; yet he is a man (male) of notorious weaknesses. In addition, this co-text exposes the Queen of Sheba’s double role: she is a foreign potentate but also a foreign woman and thus, by implication, a potential future bride.32 The story in Midrash Mishle ends with the queen’s blessings, with her acknowledgment of Solomon’s greatness, and, above all, with her recognition of his God, Who made him king. The midrashic story omits the exchange of gifts. This omission may be explained in various ways: the gifts could be associated with a marriage, an implication that the midrashic narrative seems to want to avoid; or they might remind us of another of Solomon’s sins, that of amassing silver and gold. They could also be perceived as adding to the queen’s strength. On the face of it, the midrashic story supports the biblical declaration that the queen’s visit was a success. However, the midrashic story, through the riddling process, casts doubt on Solomon’s unequivocal victory.
Traditions of the Queen of Sheba and Solomon
The many traditions concerning the Queen of Sheba and Solomon—together and alone—are important underpinnings of the midrashic story. A talmudic passage of earlier composition than the midrash states: “Whoever says that the Queen of [malkat] Sheba was a woman is in error; the word malkat here means the kingdom of [malkhut] Sheba.”33 Later, Kabbalah and seventeenth-century German Jewish folklore associate her with Lilith (a demon said to have been Adam’s first wife).34 The two traditions seem quite different. The first depersonalizes the biblical encounter, transforming the foreign queen to a (de-feminized) political entity. The second transforms the biblical queen to a prototypical she-demon.35 Both, however, may be rooted in or may be addressing postbiblical traditions in which the Queen of Sheba was perceived as a demon or as possessing demonic qualities.36 Thus, the Talmud’s curious erasure of the queen may be responding to this very tradition—which surfaces later—and its possible negative ramifications regarding Solomon.
The Targum sheni describes the queen’s meeting with Solomon. It tells us how Solomon, famous throughout the world for his wealth and great wisdom, holds a banquet for the kings of the East and of the West. He also invites all the beasts, the spirits, and the demons, who dance before him. The wild cock of the woods does not attend. To atone for his rude absence, he tells the king about the place that he has just visited: a wonderful country with silver-paved streets and gardens watered from paradise, ruled by a woman. The cock suggests that Solomon summon the exotic queen. The king sends the wild cock to summon her, supplying him with an escort of birds who darken the skies of Qitor, the queen’s kingdom. Solomon also supplies the cock with a threatening letter, in which he informs her, among other things, that since his army is composed of spirits and demons, he can inflict upon her and her kingdom a grave disaster if she refuses his invitation. After sending a preliminary expedition of six thousand boys and girls who look alike and who are dressed uniformly (as in the third riddle in Midrash Mishle), she arrives in Jerusalem, where she finds Solomon sitting in a glass house. Since she mistakenly believes him to be sitting in water, she rolls up her dress. It is then that her hairy legs are revealed to Solomon. Addressing her, he says: “Thy beauty is that of women and your hair is that of men; hair is becoming of a man and disgraceful for a woman” (chapter 3). Ignoring his last comment, she presents him with three riddles, all of which he solves. She is taken to his palace, where she witnesses his wealth, hands him gifts, and receives what she asks for.37
The queen’s hirsute legs are significant. They allude to her demonic nature—hairiness is a common attribute of witches in folklore.38 Arabic traditions state explicitly that the Queen of Sheba is a daughter of demons. According to these traditions, the king’s advisers oppose his marrying the queen, since they know that she is a demon. Knowing this, they realize that she must have hairy legs. For Solomon, the queen’s hairy legs signal a reprehensible gender-crossing; in other traditions, she is explicitly demonic. Whether labeled “manlike” or a demon, she is clearly perceived as defying set categories.
The Quran (Sura 27, “The Ants”) places the Queen of Sheba’s visit in the context of Solomon’s summoning sun worshipers to his palace. They are brought there to meet the king, who is a prophet of Allah, so that they will come to believe in the true God. In this version, Solomon also receives the queen in a glass palace, which she mistakes for water. She tucks up her skirts, but there is no mention of her hairy legs. But Solomon’s ruse and the queen’s misapprehension display his superiority over her. Commentators on the Quranic story elaborate on this meeting of sovereigns, drawing on the biblical narrative, oral Jewish or Christian traditions, or, it seems likely, folk materials that circulated in Arab culture. Al-Tabari (839–923) adds to the Quran’s version that the djinns, fearing that Solomon intended to marry the Queen of Sheba, tell him about her hairy legs. After devising the glass-house trick and seeing that the accusation was valid, he orders the djinns to prepare a special depilatory ointment.39 A later commentator, al-Thalabi (first half of the eleventh century), offers a different tale, according to which the Queen of Sheba is the only daughter of a king. When the king dies, there is strong opposition to her accession to the throne. She then marries the rival claimant. But on their wedding night, she cuts off his head and takes his place as ruler.40
